Conventionally, in a case of driving a motor or the like by an FET (field effect transistor) circuit, a pre-driver is used to supply a relatively large current to the FET. The pre-driver is often configured as an IC, and it supplies a current to a gate of the FET, which is an external part, to drive the FET.
In general, various protection functions in consideration of a fault and the like are provided for a whole system including the pre-driver and drivers such as an FET driving circuit. For example, in a case of a system in which a motor is driven by the FET driving circuit, control such as turning off a power source is performed by a microcomputer or the like to take safety measures when an output current of the FET is abnormal.
However, protection functions for the IC itself which constitutes the pre-driver are not provided. It is necessary to cause a large current of about several amperes to flow to an MOS transistor constituting the pre-driver in order to improve response performance of a driver. Therefore, there is a problem that there is a possibility that, if a fault of driving parts, various faults such as a sky fault and a ground fault of an IC terminal or the like occur, the pre-driver is destroyed, or other functions are adversely influenced.